What If George

 Isn't as Dumb

as He Appears?

 By Nolan K. Anderson

"More and more of our imports are coming from overseas".

"The best place for the facts to be done is by somebody who's spending time investigating it".

"You see, not only did the attacks help accelerate a recession,

the attacks reminded us that we are at war".

--George W. Bush

It is a long standing mystery how anyone who sounds as marginally literate as George Bush could ever become President of the United States - even in a country where his election couldn't even pass a Mayor Daley's "smell test". How could we Americans elect a graduate of Harvard with a Masters Degree - admittedly "C" grade - that has such a struggle with appearing to be coherent?  If George were a graduate of a "normal" college, it would be understandable - but not for a graduate of Harvard.

The cynics in the crowd have thought from the beginning of "George's War" on Iraq that he launched the war for four reasons:

(1)            To secure his re-election.

(2)            To avoid an oncoming recession.  

(3)            To repay corporate campaign contributions

(4)            To steal Iraq's oil.

The first three reasons are still valid, but reason number four, although still valid, needs further amplification if one is to see the broader picture and how it more fully applies to the United States.

The objective of stealing Iraq's oil would seem to be fully self-explanatory and fully comprehensive.  However, there are points in this objective which are somewhat obscured by the obvious.  First, those people who have devoted themselves to the study of "peak oil" and all its ramifications present several interesting points. Although Iraq's 112 billion barrel underground reserves make it the number two oil reservoir in the world, even that amount of oil in terms of present world consumption represents only a four-year world oil supply at present consumption rates.  Of course, the world is not going to get its total oil supply from Iraq for the next four years even if the insurgents stop damaging the production and transportation facilities. Neither is world oil demand going to remain static for the next 10 or 20 years.  Expert opinion is that the world oil requirement today is approximately 29 billion barrels per year; this demand is expected to increase to 43 billion barrels per year in the next 20 years.  To put these figures in perspective, it is anticipated that the world demand for oil will exceed the world's production capabilities between 2008 and 2012.

If one can believe even a portion of Iraq's present production figures, Iraq today is producing something near one million barrels of oil per day. However, any figure quoted by any source is strictly conjectured since production is not even being metered today.  Apparently neither the Iraqi government nor the US government is interested in even knowing how much oil is being sold or produced.  It appears that neither side is willing to investigate where Iraq's oil revenues are going.  Why would governments, which are interested in looting anyone or anything under normal conditions, not be willing to tax and spend Iraq's oil revenues?  Questions of this type become distractions to the central question of world oil requirements versus world production capabilities.

The central issue here is why George Bush chose to invade Iraq in 2003 even with the obvious financial lure of stealing an estimated 112 billion barrels of oil - which represents a significant portion of the total world oil reserve.  As a matter of significance in answering the question is the fact that Saddam was preparing to allow payment for Iraqi oil in currencies other than the US dollar.  Specifically, he was prepared to allow for oil payment in Euros.  Such heresy was seen then and is seen now by our warlords to be worthy of demonization, invasion and the total destruction of a country and its people.   In fact, to date such heresy has warranted killing over 100,000 thousand Iraqi civilians and 2250 US service personnel with 223 billion borrowed US dollars.  So, one sees that the US takes an extremely dim view of such a selfish unilateral approach to government.

We invaded Iraq, killed 100,000 civilians, contaminated the whole country with radioactive debris to the point of genocide of Iraqis and the virtual long term destruction of a very significant number of our own military - for the purpose of giving the Iraqi people "democracy" and the ability to govern themselves just as soon as we say they are capable of doing so.  How may people are able believe such a demented rationalization?  (How many people watch the Super Bowl?)

Today we sit poised with Israel for the invasion of Iran for the same crime as Saddam committed - namely, the destruction of the US dollar as the world's reserve currency by establishing an independent system of barter for world trade in oil.  But today we tell the world we are poised to invade Iran because Iran insists on exercising the same freedom of choice as our government and that of Israel - to possess and exploit atomic power - whether for peaceful or destructive purposes.  However, our politicians will never tell us that the destructive power of atomic weapons in the hands of one country - Iran - is infinitely less destructive than the potential destructive effect of removing the US dollar as the world's reserve currency.  The truth is that we - America - possess the atomic weapons power to destroy humanity.  The Iranians are poised to unleash a weapon powerful enough to change life on the planet, as we have known it since 1945, with the formation of the Bretton Woods Agreement and its effective establishment of the US dollar as the world reserve currency.  In effect, we have a pending "Battle of the Titans".  The truth is that if the dollar ceases to be the world reserve currency and its effect is that the US can borrow no more from foreigners, the "war" with Iran (or any other country) will come to an immediate halt.  Without the ability to finance our wars with borrowed money, all our battlefield gadgets become useless.  At that point, the whole world is poised to feast upon the assets of the helpless giant.

Conclusion:

The original question concerned George Bush's intellect and intelligence. There is ample evidence that George Bush is no Einstein, but that doesn't rule out the possibility that his handlers were able, at some point before the invasion of Iraq, to get George to understand that there was a great deal more involved with controlling Iraq than just confiscating its oil.  Saddam's sin was not only that of trying to bite the hand that had been feeding him, but also he was threatening to cut the "feeding hand" off at the pocket book.  If Bush's handlers not only in Washington but also Tel Aviv had been able to impress on him the significance of Saddam's perfidy, then possibly one could stretch his imagination far enough to conclude that George really had the best interests of the United States at heart when he invaded Iraq.  Today if George's handlers have been able to make him understand that Iran's position is infinitely more dangerous than any danger Saddam ever posed, then war with Iran with its consequent $100+ per barrel oil is a virtual certainty.  After all, the destruction of our currency is immensely more dangerous than a few aerial drones without biological weapons or even the scattered "mushroom cloud".

References:

  1.    What They Don't Want You to Know About The Coming Oil Crisis

           By Jeremy Leggett Published:  The Independent - 20 January 2006

  2.    The Proposed Iranian Oil Bourse

           By Krassimir Petrov, Ph.D. I. Economics of Empires  01/19/06 "Gold Eagle

Nolan K. Anderson is a retired engineer and a veteran of Korea who was once a "conservative" until he found there was nothing left to conserve and as a veteran hates to see a tour in Korea go to waste.

(He may be reached at nkanders@bellsouth.net ).